Last Sunday, columnist Lori Sturdevant pointed that our state needs to better train its workforce ("We're gonna need a better workforce," March 10), citing evidence that we are not producing enough skilled workers to fill current job vacancies. She went on to explain that we can ill-afford to watch our businesses seek high-skilled workers elsewhere and gear down here at home if Minnesota " is going to stay prosperous enough to educate workers for a knowledge-based economy …"
Her article featured the efforts of state Rep. Paul Marquart, DFL-Dilworth, who wants to develop "a real strategy for raising the educational attainment of the state's workforce."
On Tuesday, Rep. Kevin Dahle, DFL-Northfield, contributed an article denouncing the basic-skills test that is part of the Minnesota Teacher Licensing Examinations ("Minnesota teachers take a test that's unfair," March 12). "It is a bad test. Period," he wrote. "It needs to be eliminated."
Dahle's argument was partly based on the situation of an art teacher who, "unless we eliminate the test, will lose his job." He also laments the bind in which many of our minority teacher candidates find themselves: "Studies done at Augsburg College show a significant drop in passing rates among minority teachers, including those with English as a first language." (My emphasis.)
Hmmm. Now, I cannot comment on the exact content of the MTLE basic-skills test — it's held secret — but I can offer my observations as a teacher and tutor:
• We are doing a lousy job of teaching our youngsters to write and speak effectively. It is common knowledge. Over the last two decades, colleges and universities have created remedial writing labs to address this growing problem. A 2011 job outlook survey conducted by the National Association of Colleges and Employers found that verbal communication was at the top of the list of skills employers are looking for in college graduates.
• We can't expect to prepare workers for a "knowledge-based economy" if we don't have a knowledge-based education system. Beginning in the 1970s, our schools abandoned the conservative model of educating children — not altogether a bad thing, I hasten to add — and adopted the humanitarian model. Phonics was out; "whole language" was in. Competition gave way to cooperation. Content was to a large extent replaced by process, and rigor began to morph into fluff. Textbooks became less prevalent, and teachers were called on to create more of their own curricula.
Again, this was not all bad. After all, our children did feel better about themselves. But the system became very disjointed as administrators and teachers flailed about in waves of new initiatives that came and went with the tides. As a result, there was, and still is, little consistency in the quality of the product — our students.
